Test Drive Meme # 1

[hadrielmods]

Welcome to Hadriel's very first test drive, and thank you again for your interest in the game! As always, our reserves page is here, and our applications page is here! Reserves open September 24th, and Apps are open October 1st.

Two quick points here as well:

1. Any thread made in Hadriel's test drive will be accepted as the sole Action Log sample in the application.
2. All threads made in the test drive can be considered game canon!

Test drives will be broken up into specific god mini-events, during which your characters can see how well they fare under the watchful eye of one of the gods. Choose wisely or just simply pick 'em all, and have fun!

F E A R

SCENARIO ONE: ANYONE GOT A LIGHT?
[The Door brings in all that is chaotic and evil in the world. This may include you, may include the person next to you... and may include the monster behind you.

Watch out as you explore the streets of Hadriel, because you're not alone, and there's always something on the rooftops watching and waiting for the perfect opportunity to separate you from your group and tear you into pieces. In this instance, the door has managed to grab something truly horrific, and it's definitely out for blood (and brains) tonight.

Smokers are enemies in the video game series Left 4 Dead, who use their prehensile tongues to capture unwitting people and either drag them away for consumption or hang them up to strangle them. With all of the activity of characters trying to find out what's going on and where they are, there are more than a few of them, lingering in the shadows and waiting to try strike at anyone who may be lagging behind.]


SCENARIO TWO: YOUR HEART WILL GO ON
[You awaken in a windowless room, the walls strangely curved. The door, when you try it, is quite firmly locked. No amount of force is able to break through, so it seems to be sealed by supernatural means. Next to the door stands a slender pedestal, about as big around as a large man's thigh. At the top of the pedestal is a indentation, as if something were meant to go there.

But you're not alone in this room. There are two things with you: a person and a corpse. Pinned to the body is a note: Place a heart on the pedestal to leave. Tucked neatly into the corpse's pocket is a letter opener, small and not particularly sharp.

Did you have weapons or tools on you before? You don't now. But look at it this way: what better form of bonding is there than helping a friend or stranger dig a heart out of a corpse with nothing but a letter opener and your bare hands?]


H O P E

SCENARIO THREE: HAVE YOU HAD YOUR BREAK-IN TODAY?
[You're standing outside a storefront, colored glass set into intricate designs. It's beautiful, artistic, but more importantly - there's definitely food inside. Good food, too, by the glimpses you can see through the window. In fact - wait a minute - isn't that your favorite dish in there, just waiting for you? You've been searching for food for hours, it seems, and the city is bare. Your tummy is getting awful rumbly. What luck!

You try the door. Cruelly, it is locked. The food taunts you, just out of reach.

The glass is lovely, intricate, but it's just glass. Or maybe you know how to pick locks. Or maybe there's a back way in. Or maybe some passing friend will be able to help you. There's a lot of options here, if what you really want is a mouthful of the finest... whatever it is you like.]

Comments

[unknowable]

[It's true. It could theoretically be more gross. Unfortunately, that doesn't take away any of the current grossness, of which there is more than enough. Adam is watching, though, much as it makes his stomach twist a bit. No point in hiding his eyes when he'll be doing his own part soon enough.]

Not quite like the fetal pigs they had us do in biology, I guess.

[Well, Adam did it, for extra credit, because of course he did. This is very different, though. Much more - immediate. That body was a person, once.]

See if you can get some of that off your hands, and I'll do the rest.

[mintly]

No, they were nice enough to take the blood out of those first. We're not so lucky this time.

[gansey is trying very hard not to think about how he just cut into something that used to be a person, or the very particular feeling of skin giving to the pressure of a semi-sharp object. he would really like to not need to think about these things.]

Are you sure? There's a lot of...stuff in there.

[who knew that human ribcages were chock full of organs? technically, both of them, but it's different actually looking at it. he gives the lung another poke, this time pushing it to the side.]

[unknowable]

Yeah, I'll just - um. Go in there and try to get it out.

[There really is a lot of stuff in there. Adam also didn't quite realize how much. But they just need to sort of... shove it aside, right? Then he can go in and cut the heart loose. It'll involve a lot of sawing, and gross things from those organs will probably get all over him, but. Well. He's used to being covered in grease and dirt, he'll just... pretend it's nothing worse than that.]

I'll finish it up.

[He reaches out to take the letter opener from Gansey and get to work.]

[mintly]

If you're sure.

[but he knows adam is sure, so he hands over the letter opener and starts sliding the corpse's unbuttoned shirt up away from where all the mess is probably going to get. it's the only thing they have to clean up with, after all. plus, getting it off will be an excellent distraction from what adam's doing. or rather, what gansey is letting adam do instead of doing it himself like he should, because god knows that adam doesn't need to be traumatized any more than he has been already.

it also turns out that lifting the arms over the head has the helpful side effect of giving the ribs room to expand, making adam's work at least a tiny bit easier.]

[unknowable]

[It sure sounded easy when he said it like that, but the actual action is - less so. Sticking his hand in a dead body, pushing organs out of the way, and trying to cut through tough heart muscle was, oddly enough, not on Adam's bucket list. His stomach turns, but he is determined, and if there's one thing about Adam it's that when he's determined he'll always see something through.

Even if that something is getting tacky, dead blood on him. The letter opener slips against the arteries as Adam saws away, and briefly he wishes for something sharper. But there isn't much point in wishing, so he just keeps cutting.

He doesn't look at Gansey, or even really at the body, since he mostly can't see what he's doing. Working by touch makes things harder, but - well. Things are hard enough that little difficulties like that make no real difference.

It seems to take forever, but when Adam finally straightens up, he is, in fact, able to pull the heart free. His hands and arms are covered in a disgusting array of things that he doesn't want to think about, but there. Success.]

Got it.

[mintly]

Good.

[while adam has been concentrating on his task, gansey's been working on his own, which means that as soon as adam's arms are free of the corpse gansey is there with the dead man's shirt, wiping adam's arms free of all the things on them that he's striving not to think about very hard. given that it's blood, he can't really get everything off, but adam is infinitely less covered in viscera than he might otherwise be, at least until they can find some water.]

Okay. Onto the pillar it goes, I guess.

[unknowable]

[The look he gives Gansey is one of deep appreciation. They'll both need to clean off thoroughly after this, but even that little bit helps. At least he doesn't feel quite so much like a necrophiliac grave robber, and a bit less like he's going to throw up, too.

He stands, holding the heart carefully. It's slippery. Adam has never held a human heart in his hands before, he thinks distantly, but it's not so strange. He walks to the pillar and sets the heart atop it, and with a click, the door swings open.

Adam exhales. On some level, he'd been worried that they'd go through all of that and it wouldn't work.]

Oh, thank god. Let's get out of here.